


Sub Level Three

by Ylevihs



Series: How Not to Fall [49]
Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén
Genre: Canon typical anxiety, Mentions of Injuries, Mentions of Violence, Spoilers, headcanon heavy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-04-12
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:21:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,023
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23612230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ylevihs/pseuds/Ylevihs
Summary: All business
Relationships: Herald/Sidestep (Fallen Hero)
Series: How Not to Fall [49]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1327892
Comments: 1
Kudos: 19





	Sub Level Three

Richard was no more naked or exposed than any other time he’d walked into HQ. But he felt much, much more vulnerable. There was no way he could have shown up in his armor. Not unless he’d wanted to cause a very different sort of scene than the one he intended. And no way to justify coming in through the parking garage—not if he was arriving alone. Even if they’d gotten used to seeing him there. He had desperately hoped not too accustomed to it, but there was no taking it back now. He showed up to see Ricardo. He showed up to train Daniel. He showed up to walk home with Daniel after work. After Daniel had let it slip that they were. Well.

It.

Always a risk. Stepping a single foot inside the building. All the way back when he had first agreed to help Argent. It had been foolish. It had been cocky to think that he could put up his shields and go unnoticed. Hidden cameras on him. Eyes on him. Passing over him. None of them lingering for longer than a brief ‘oh, him’ before being gently redirected by unseen hands. Or so he had thought. Was it one person? Could be. Could have been. May have been even more. May have been every single person in the building. After all.

After all, someone had to sign the bottom of the check that sent government funding to the Rangers. Why would it be wrong to assume that it wasn’t a certain Senator?

The woman at the front desk smiled at him, thoughts pulsing nervously. Richard was blasting an aura that said he was uninteresting and non-threatening, which meant the nerves were coming from somewhere else. He sent a slightly more nuanced wave to her that there was nothing going on out of the ordinary. The wave hit and broke. She was still focused on him. A hot knife through. Through.

She clung. And noticed that he looked like a special kind of shit.

“Hello Richard, good afternoon,” forced but pleasant. The tone of a distracted business worker who now has to play customer service nice. “How are you doing today?” fidgeting in her seat. He was in no mood to wait and see, slipping into her stream of thought and. Oh.

Oh, there had been an email. That said? That said he was helping them with a case.

“I’m alright,” he put on a tired looking smile and shrugged softly, leaning his elbows on the counter. It was easy to put that skin back on. Tired but harmless. Not indispensable but helpful enough, in his own way. “How has your day been going?” just a little small talk. Also not out of the ordinary. He’d been known to keep it together for entire discussions about the weather forecast with her. Once she had shown him the picture of her pets that she kept behind the desk. Friendly. She’d even remembered to tease him about the flowers he had bought for Daniel, even though it felt like that had happened years ago.

“Good,” she said. It was difficult to put edges on vowels, but she managed it. “Marshal Steel actually wanted to see you, if you stopped by?” it wasn’t really a question; hard not to ask it anyway. As far as she had known, the two of them hadn’t said so much as two sentences to each other. And those had always been either thinly veiled contempt or increasingly awkward. Good. At least that hadn’t reached the ears and eyes hidden in the walls.

“Oh?” Richard let his eyebrows raise up. Blinked a little. “Did he say what it was about?” I’m just as surprised as you are, said his tone. It didn’t help her relax at all.

“He mentioned that he wanted your help with a case they’re working on, but,” and her gaze darted from one side of the lobby to the other. Searching for. He couldn’t tell. “He said you could meet him downstairs?” Ah. Nothing casual happened in the basement levels. Even people who had never made it an inch inside headquarters knew that much. Pomp and circumstance and donuts up top. Sponsorships up top. Press releases up top. Business down below.

Richard felt himself nodding. “Which level did he want to meet me on?” not sure if he should sound more casual or nervous. After all, the Marshal wanting to see someone privately wasn’t exactly a laid-back affair. And he couldn’t afford to show the people who were watching that he was expecting Chen to be on his side. Or that he had any idea of the layouts of rooms that technically didn’t exist for public knowledge.

“Sub-Level Three,” Temporary Holding. Which explained her unasked question. Does it have to do with that woman people said they saw Herald carrying in? Did it have to do with the person Argent reported subdued and was on the way back with? She didn’t voice it. Richard didn’t answer it.

“Guess I better get a move on then,” a quick nod of the head and a step towards the elevator banks and.

Nothing good was waiting down there. He pressed the elevator call button and tried to breathe.

Regina was down there. The doors slid open.

He forced himself to press the button and relax his shoulders back. He could do this. Couldn’t he? The easy part was over. Kidnapping and threatening and ripping apart her mind. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Compared to what needed to happen now. The last thing he had wanted was for Regina to be smack dab in the center of what could turn out to be enemy territory. He still had no clue about her mental state. And apparently the special directive could track her. What if that wasn’t in her clothes? Richard had long debated the idea that the implants they’d always claimed to exist were real. He’d inspected his body as Mitzi more times than he could count without any sign of. But maybe they were. Would Regina have allowed herself to be chipped like a dog that was wont to wander?

A chime.

Followed by pleasant voice announcing his arrival on Sub Level Three. Perfume and Kidnapped Mad Scientists. Temporary Holding. Please watch his step.

It was where people would wait after being taken down by the Rangers for the police to arrive and cart them off. Or for people who claimed to work for the police to cart them off, at least. Several of the cells doubled as makeshift patient rooms. For those individuals who needed basic medical care but couldn’t be allowed into the medical wing.

He’d never had a chance to see them in person; only in the sifted through and constantly shifting memories from Daniel. And even then, he’d never wanted to linger in the ghost of places like this.

The elevator doors opened to a large desk, where Chen was sitting, several filing cabinets, and a long, broad hallway, separated from the front by thick glass. Or what seemed to be glass. Bullet proof to be certain, but likely proven against several other types of damage. And then another set of pressure sealed doors. And then another set of glass. In between the set of doors, a guard sat at a small desk, chewing gum and generally looking bored. Tapping the edge of a pen over some paperwork that wasn’t going to fill itself out.

White, featureless walls. Stark fluorescent lighting that buzzed in the back of the throat. Richard felt his stomach heave and he had to force sick strawberry froth back down.

Chen looked up at him from the folder he was reading on the desk and closed it with a firm palm. The bags under his eyes and lines around his mouth made him look about as tired as Richard felt, which wasn’t a promising sign. He met Richard’s gaze for half a second before closing his eyes, one hand coming up to pinch the bridge of his nose. The chair made an agonized shriek as Chen pushed it back to stand.

“So.” Richard tried and failed to swallow the fear swelling at the top of his throat. It sat heavily in his voice box, ready and waiting to make whatever he tried to say next sound like a frog with a hangover. There was no name to label the fear with. General anxiety plucking at the vocal cords.

“So,” Chen echoed, not quite making eye contact yet. And then sighing heavily. “They’re back this way,” he nodded over his shoulder behind the layered glass and turned to open the doors, sliding a key card in and unlocking them with a pneumatic hiss. The guard sitting just beyond straightened up. Trying to save as much professional face as he could. Chen ignored him, opening the next set of doors and motioning for Richard to come with him. Richard watched him move blankly before his legs decided to follow, stiff and disjointed feeling. Keeping unsteady pace with his longer stride.

The day’s events were starting to catch up with him. Settling real exhaustion in the lattice work of his bones. Unwelcome and.

The frog in his throat finally croaked. “Is Ricardo back yet?” which earned a small twitch from the corner of Chen’s mouth. The cousin of a wince, staying too long after the party had ended.

“He is,” a brief pause and hard sigh that made his shoulders square up. “He punched her in the face,” Chen said with a slight twist of his head, looking to see Richard’s reaction.

Ah, beans.

Richard groaned quietly. Something small in the back of his brain was flattered. The rest of his mind didn’t have the heart to shush it. Darkly pleased at the idea of her waking up with nothing but new injuries to greet her. Still. “For the love of–,”

“I know.” Chen cut him off short. “I asked him to step out to cool off for a minute and he should be back soon. But,” But? Well. That couldn’t be good. “She’s awake. Has been since Daniel brought her in—apparently, she came to just as he landed here. And she hasn’t stopped talking since,” Caution coating the back half of his words. “I didn’t hear exactly what she said, but Ricardo landed a solid hit on her for saying it,”

Cold terror flooded Richard’s lungs, crystallizing and sending sharp icicles piercing through his veins. Chen had gotten the heavily abridged version of everything that had happened to Richard at the farm. Ricardo may have filled in some of the blanks, if Chen had asked. But it wasn’t like Ricardo had all of. Daniel didn’t even know each and every last thing that had been done. That level of detail would have required a lot more stability or tequila on Richard’s part.

Which didn’t even include. Had to whisper the next question and lie to himself; claim that it was because of unknown listeners and not his own adrenaline drenched fear making him quiet. “Is there any way to destroy the audio from that room or,” there had to be. A stupid question to ask but the dread spreading through his. His. Chen was blinking at him.

“We don’t have microphones set up in those rooms,” he said, as if it were an obvious thing. Surveillance cameras were another matter altogether, though.

“Ha!” bordering on hysterical and desperately trying to reel it back in. Stuff it down. Drown it in the inky black pools gathering at the edges of Richard’s vision. Chen’s expression was shifting slightly, eyebrows dipping in. “I’m sure there aren’t any official ones set up in them,” and the expression slipped again to slightly concede the point.

“They tend not to officially set up recording devices in these rooms in case of…unwanted media attention,” Chen’s voice dipped low and softer. And more sour sounding. It helped the realization to click in Richard’s head. Couldn’t have the Rangers looking bad, after all. So, the line they fed to the Marshal was that these rooms were clean of surveillance. Clean to use for. Ha. Not interrogation, no, certainly not that. But if there was anything that they wanted or needed to do that they didn’t need the press hounding them about. Hm. Didn’t take much to feel how strongly Chen disapproved of the idea, even through his shields.

But it still didn’t mean that they weren’t bugged. Didn’t mean whatever she was spouting wasn’t being.

Chen turned a sudden corner, heading down a narrower corridor. If Richard hadn’t been following, he would have missed it for sure. Doors lined either side. Thick and solid looking, with small square windows at roughly head height for the average person. Some would have special reinforcements to deal with the boosts and mods that got brought in.

Richard inhaled against the stricture in his throat. “Should I ask what she’s been saying?” Clearly hadn’t damaged the language center of the brain then. He couldn’t tell if he was disappointed by that or not. If she could talk, then it was likely she could understand what was being said to her. Which could be used to his advantage. It all depended on what he had managed to ruin.

The pause between the two of them grew rapidly and stretched out its legs. Finally, Chen stopped at a door, completely indistinguishable from every door around it, save for the number plate at the side.

“Mostly she just sounds confused,” turning to the door and hand coming to rest on the handle, key card almost ready to swipe it unlocked. “Asking where she is and why she’s here. But she doesn’t seem distressed,” his voice shifted. Hardened to a diamond edge. “Even when Ricardo punched her, she didn’t seem upset by it. Just confused about why he would do that to her,”

There was no silent accusation being thrown over his shoulder for Richard to catch. Instead it sat huge and ugly on the floor between them. Or. Maybe less? It. Chen turned as the door beeped the all clear and slid the key card out. Just barely turning the handle to keep it from re-locking on him. “Do you want me to go in with you?” quiet enough. Not quiet enough to hide the slight lilt at the end. Not a neutral offer either. “Daniel’s already in there,”

Richard didn’t trust his voice to answer that. But he felt his head nodding. From the way certain lines on Chen’s forehead lessened, he could guess that it was the right answer. Down at his sides, Richard’s hands clenched into fists that he couldn’t make relax.

The room was bigger than Richard had anticipated it to be. Not large by any measure, but still not small. It reeked of chemical disinfectant. There was enough space for a few chairs, arranged in the center of the room, facing the bed. Daniel was seated in one of them with his back to the door, shoulders sloping down. A hospital style bed. A toilet in the corner, unshielded. No privacy allotments here. No other furniture. No windows. The bright fluorescent lights were set back into the ceiling, behind glass, to keep prying fingers from breaking them loose. No light switches. No hard edges. If there were dampeners meant to be at work in the room, he couldn’t feel them. Richard’s eyes tried to take in every other aspect of the room besides. Besides.

Failed.

She was in the small bed. Lying flat and. And thank god, looking away from him. Staring up. Mouth moving. He didn’t let himself listen to her quite yet, pushing those messages from his mind to the back of the line. Strapped down at the ankles and wrists—not tightly, not enough to injure her. Enough to keep her in place. Someone had changed her into a hospital gown. Her own clothes were folded neatly and on the ground at the foot of the bed. Who had? Had Daniel? No. Then. They had medical personnel on staff, he knew that. And now one of them knew that she was there and. There was a fresh IV, now placed securely in the crook of her elbow. A quick glance at the hanging bag showed it to be a plain, unadulterated drip. Keeping her hydrated. There was already a sign of swelling around her.

Don’t look at her face. Don’t look at her at all, look anywhere else. Anywhere.

He settled on the back of Daniel’s head. Taking the few steps forward, footsteps heavy and loud. Echoing? How could they be so? So. Just in his head then. Daniel glanced up at him. Not quite a smile. Not a flinch. Something in between grim and relieved. Reaching to. To. Touch his hand and oh. Gently try to keep him from tearing the skin on his palms loose again. Pulling the fist open to slide his fingers between Richard’s. Behind them both Chen clicked the door shut. There was an electronic beep as the secondary lock kicked in. 

It echoed in the empty spaces of his sinuses.

They could not, absolutely could not, keep her there. He needed to find somewhere else. Anywhere else that he could be sure wouldn’t be raided or razed to the ground while he. While he went to handle the farm properly. Somewhere that could last more than a few days. Until he could either get back into town or Mia Ochoa could finish reviewing the files on Regina’s computer and get her story written up. 

Regina tried fruitlessly to shift on the bed, knees raising up and torso wiggling from side to side. It was a slow, non-urgent motion, trying to get more comfortable. Someone had reset her dislocated shoulder. The breathes in and out of her broken nose still whistled. The movement stopped after a moment. She still wasn’t looking at him, eyes apparently fine with staring up at the ceiling. Maybe he had damaged her sight? And then Richard’s ears finally caught up with the rest of his body.


End file.
